Gender, Parenthood, and Job-Family Compatibility

This article explores the contention that the concentration of women in certain jobs that accommodate parenting can help explain both occupational gender segregation and the lower wages received by women employed full time. Evidence from the 1977 Quality of Employment Survey shows that the combination of both schedule flexibility and ease of job performance most clearly reduces job-family conflict for parents. However, mothers employed over 30 hours a week are not more likely to be in jobs with those characteristics, nor are predominantly female jobs in general likely to possess that cluster of characteristics shown to reduce job-family conflict.

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